A special issue on philanthropy.

Gifts for You

A special issue on philanthropy.

Welcome to Slate's October 2007 special issue on philanthropy. On Sunday and Monday at the Clinton Presidential Center in Little Rock, Ark., we're hosting the Slate 60 Conference on Innovative Philanthropy with our co-sponsors, the William J. Clinton Foundation and the University of Arkansas Clinton School of Public Service. The conference will feature philanthropists like Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Eli Broad and public figures like Bill Clinton and Eliot Spitzer.

For our issue today, we have a series of articles on the history and politics of giving. Beverly Gage looks back to the 1920s and finds the Rockefellers and Carnegies giving away small fortunes—out of fear of class warfare. Lincoln Caplan explains why large donors back Teach for America despite its critics. To promote competition among nonprofits, Doug Smith proposes a fantasy philanthropy league to reward them for superior performance. Ray Fisman investigates whether it pays for companies to be virtuous and why consumers buy more do-gooder products.